“We are not here to fit in, be well balanced, or provide exempla for others. We are here to be eccentric, different, perhaps strange, perhaps merely to add our small piece, our little clunky, chunky selves, to the great mosaic of being. As the gods intended, we are here to become more and more ourselves”

(Hollis, What Matters Most, xiii).

Let’s consider James Hollis’s assertion: “We are here to become more and more ourselves.” What does it mean to become more and more ourselves? To find our purpose? To find our calling? What is a calling? Thomas Moore defined calling as “the sense that you are on this earth for a reason, that you have a destiny, no matter how great or small” (A Life at Work, p.17). Richard Leider and David Shapiro saw it as “the inner urge to give our gifts away” (Whistle While You Work, p. xi) . James Hillman stated that it is “not what you do, it’s the way you do it” (The Soul’s Code, p.255). Parker Palmer shared, it “does not mean a goal that I pursue. It means a calling that I hear” (Let Your Life Speak, p.4). Carl Jung described his encounter with calling with the following words: “From the beginning I had a sense of destiny, as though my life was assigned to me by fate, and had to be fulfilled” (Memories, Dreams, Reflections, p. 48).

Our calling is essentially our need to make a difference in the world, to share our gifts with others. It is more than what we do for work; in fact, it may not even be our paid work. Our life purpose may happen once the work day is over, or on the weekend. It may be volunteer time that we give; it may be a difference we make for our family and friends. Your purpose is how you share your authentic self with others, not if you get paid to do it or how many people you make that difference for.

Keep sparkling!

This calling, this life purpose, comes from deep within us. It is more than our conscious self deciding what we want to be when we grow up. As James Hollis observed, “We may choose careers, but we do not choose vocation. Vocation chooses us” (Finding Meaning, p.149). James Hillman likened our life purpose to being called onto a particular path, with an intuitive understanding that “This is what I must do, this is what I’ve got to have. This is who I am” (The Soul’s Code, p. 3).

There are a few things to remember when you’re considering your calling. First, during your life you may feel as if you have one central calling, or you may feel the pull of a number of different calls – you don’t have to limit yourself to just one. Second, a calling finds meaning in what is underneath the actual work you do: It is the how you do it. What it looks like on the surface may change, so the what you do may be different as you move throughout your life. Same calling, the same gifts shared with others, but expressed in a different way.

So, if the what keeps changing, why is it so important to discover our calling, to find our purpose? I don’t think everyone angsts about their calling, but some of us – and I count myself in this group – feel as if there is a difference that they are called to make in the world, and to them, it is vitally important to feel as if they are making that difference. Living a life that provides me with the opportunity to make that difference for others is how I become more and more myself, to add my small piece to the great mosaic of being.

And so, I ask you: How are you called to become more and more yourself?

Until next time...

Keep sparkling!

Marta